Onchain Custodian announces first customers and tech partnerships including Accuity for KYC/AML

Onchain Custodian (ONC) has released a list of new clients and technology partnerships for its institutional digital asset custody service following its launch two weeks ago.

The clients being onboarded include Tembusu Partners, Fission Capital and Timestamp Capital, Milestone, among a handful of others.

The Singapore-based digital asset custodian has also announced a partnership with Accuity to use its KYC and AML/CFT compliance process.

Onchain will also work with securities token platform Polymath, which will refer ONC as one of its custodian service providers.

“Digital asset investments are tricky to manage in view of the current diversity of blockchain and token protocols,”said Sandy Peng, partner of Fission Capital. “Having the secure single window access to blockchains that Onchain Custodian offers will help us manage our investments.”

ONC is backed by venture capital firms Sequoia, Fosun and DHVC, and completed the testing process for the platform in early April.

The SAFE platform has been developed to secure digital asset investments with customisable custody solutions and institutional grade security and controls, according to the vendor, and will be accompanied by a line of value-added services.

ONC has said the platform, which supports mainstream cryptocurrencies and tokens, will be expanded to handle securities tokens and stable coins “as the regulation and industry develop.”

“Third-party custody is one of the fundamental pillars needed to drive mainstream adoption of tokenised assets,” said Da Hongfei, board chair of ONC. “Onchain Custodian is contributing this important piece of infrastructure to the digital asset economy.”

Custody of digital assets including cryptocurrencies has proved to be a stumbling block for the growth of institutional adoption, with the chair of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Jay Clayton, recently highlighting custody and price manipulation concerns as the two factors holding back Bitcoin ETFs from being approved in the US.

It’s also a problem that has attracted attention from larger institutional players, both on the buy- and sell-sides, with Fidelity Investments, Standard Chartered, Northern Trust and SIX all having announced their own planned or in-development offerings for crypto custody.